Stealing Asia (11 page)

I noticed that
he referred to Esteban as my “friend”. I wondered if he thought that I had
somehow deliberately sabotaged the attempt to apprehend him on the island. As
far as I could see, I had friends on neither side. I was only co-operating with
the CIA so that I could get out of there.

‘And Esteban?’

‘Still at
large.’

I leaned back in
my chair. It was obvious what information he wanted from me and I did not see
how I could help. Everything that I thought I knew about Esteban was a lie. I
could not think of one useful piece of information I could tell him.

‘In that case,
you should be out looking for him.’ I said. ‘What if he comes after Asia
again?’

‘I’m actually
counting on him doing just that. It saves us a lot of trouble if he comes to
us.’

‘So why do you
need me?’

‘I want you to
tell us why he has been following the girl. If we knew that, it would make it a
lot easier to figure out who he is and who he is working for.’

‘I already told
you that I don’t know anything about him.’

He placed his
hands palm down on the desk and leaned in closer.

‘Not him; her.
Tell us about this girl of yours.’

‘What’s there to
tell? Whatever you want to know, it would be much easier to just ask her
yourself. Besides, I thought that the CIA knew everything they needed to know
about their citizens. You probably know more about Asia than she does herself.’

He reached into
his pocket and pulled out the wallet with the badge in it. He chucked it across
the table to me. I flipped it open, not quite sure what he wanted me to see. As
I looked over the document again, he un-holstered his handgun and placed it on
the table.

‘Do you like the
badge?’ he asked.

I shrugged, as I
was not quite sure how to respond.

‘It only cost me
the equivalent of two hundred bucks on the Kao San Road,’ he said, the smirk
returning to his face. ‘It’s saved me a hundred times that amount in bribes. It
fooled you and it will fool the coastguard if they come snooping around.’

I returned the
wallet and swallowed hard. Esteban had said that they had played me for a fool
and he was right.

‘Who are you?’ I
asked.

He shook his
head and put the wallet back into his pocket.

‘That is not how
this game works. I ask the questions and you give the answers. If you stick to
those rules, you may actually walk out of this room on your own two feet. Now
tell me why somebody would be running surveillance on your girlfriend.’

‘I already told
you that I don’t know.’

He picked up the
gun and pointed it directly at my forehead.

‘Stick to the
rules, Ben. You’re not allowed to pass on these questions. What makes your girl
so special?’

If I did not
tell him, the next person in this interrogation room would be Asia. If he was
willing to kill me, he would not hesitate to torture her.

‘She’s a
runaway.’

‘Running away
from what?’

He kept the gun
trained on me.

‘Her family, she
has really overbearing parents. You know how it is; they put pressure on her to
go to the right school and keep the right friends. She couldn’t take it anymore
and bailed.’

‘Tell me about
this family; are they rich.’

‘I guess so.
It’s not something we ever talked about.’

There was a
shift in his eyes. He had spotted something in my body language.

‘You’re lying. I
won’t ask the question again.’

This time he
really was about to pull the trigger. I had no choice.

‘Yes.’

‘Yes, you’re
lying?’

‘Yes, they’re
rich.’

He pulled back
the gun slightly, redirecting the nozzle to just above my head.

‘Go on...’

‘Her father is a
musician,’ I paused awkwardly, because I knew how ridiculous the end of that
sentence was going to sound. ‘He’s a famous musician.’

The
interrogation ended not long after I had betrayed the woman that I loved. I
walked out unaided, on my own two feet. I was then taken deeper into the bowels
of the ship where I was placed into a much larger cell. This time, I was not
alone. There were a half dozen bunk beds and the room resembled a dormitory.

‘Take any bed
that you want,’ said Clay. ‘You may be here a while and we want your stay to be
comfortable.’

I looked at the
nearest bed. It was not built for comfort. Clay shoved me away from the door.

‘One more
thing,’ he added. ‘You’re free to fraternise with our other guests, but if I
catch you fucking any of them you’re going into solitary AND I’ll tell your
girlfriend.’

He slammed the
door shut and locked it behind him. It was then that I noticed something that
the other prisoners all had in common. Every one of them was female. This gave
me a fleeting hope that Asia would be amongst them, but she was not. I did,
however, see two faces I did recognise.

‘Ben!’ exclaimed
Izzie, as she ran across the room and threw her arms around me. ‘We thought
they were going to kill you. I’m so glad you’re alive.’

Her eyes were
bloodshot and bordered by dark rings. I could tell she had been crying, but she
was genuinely pleased to see me. At least I now knew that I was not the only
one to have been taken in by Clay and Barrett.

‘What is this
place?’ I asked.

Another girl,
who had come over to check me out, provided the answer. She had been kept
onboard for four months. This made her the longest serving prisoner. There were
seven of them in total, including the English pair. All had fallen for the same
scam. They had been travelling through Thailand when they had encountered the
American pair. They were then seduced before being brought aboard the ship.
Their passports and subsequently their identities were taken from them. No
doubt sold on to criminals or refuges hoping for an authentic alias or just a
fresh start in life. There was no hope of anyone going home. Eventually, the
girls would be sold off as sex slaves or simply made to disappear forever.

‘Where is Asia?’
I asked Izzie.

‘We don’t know,’
she replied. Her bottom lip was trembling and I could tell she was not hopeful
for my girlfriend’s safety. ‘She knew something was up long before Dee or
myself suspected anything. Her suspicions started in the boat and had risen to
panic by the time that we were brought onboard. She tried to fight them and was
led away kicking and screaming.’

I had a brief
tinge of pride in knowing that Asia had put up a fight, but this was soon
replaced by concern. She was certainly feisty and whilst it was an attractive
quality, it could put her in more danger than she was in already. Izzie picked
up on my reaction immediately.

‘I didn’t mean
to worry you,’ she said. ‘I’m sure that wherever she is, they will not have
hurt her.’

‘It’s okay, I
understand.’

I sat down on
the bed and Izzie went back to her corner of the cell, sensing that I wanted to
be left alone for a while. Whilst the girls had all been brought here for a
reason, Asia had clearly been singled out. Because of me, they now knew who she
was. A ransom demand would surely follow. She was now the most precious cargo
for these pirates. They must have thought they had stumbled upon a treasure
chest. The odds of me being allowed near such a valuable acquisition were
non-existent. She was a hostage, I was just a witness.

I thought back
to the interrogation. There was only one reason why I would be kept alive. It
involved the unravelling of the most pertinent puzzle of all. Stalker, criminal
or spy; just who was Esteban Cruz and what was his interest in Asia?

Part 2

Chapter 1

My name is Esteban
Cruz. I do not consider myself to be a bad man, but I have done bad things.
Terrible things. For this, I am not proud. I thought I could make amends for my
past, but I was wrong. Never before had I strayed so far beyond my mission parameters
and I was paying the price. I had lost not only the girl, but now Ben had been
taken too.

The dinghy was
still within targeting range, but the way it bounced and buffered against the
waves made it impossible to achieve any kind of accuracy in my shots. The last
thing I wanted was to end up killing a hostage; especially when that hostage
had become a friend. I could only watch on as the small craft drifted out of
sight. After it disappeared over the horizon, I holstered my gun and walked up
the beach to where one of the kidnappers lay injured in the sand.

I had been
careful to place the blade in a way that would not be fatal. Until I knew who I
was dealing with, it was necessary to exercise the utmost caution. Before I
could take action, I needed information. Whether he liked it or not, this
scumbag was going to tell me everything I wanted to know.

He lay still
with his face buried in the sand. I kicked his side and the resulting groan
told me that he had not yet lost consciousness. Sadly for him, he would be
denied that luxury for a little while longer. He was strong, but I would have
expected more of a fight from a man of his size. If he was a professional, then
I would think that he operated at the lower end of the market. What I needed to
establish was whether he had been hired to go after Asia or if he had just
gotten lucky.

The rucksack he
had carried was lying just a few feet away, where it had been dropped during
the scuffle. I opened it up and searched for anything that could be of use. It
contained a map of the island, a water bottle and basic food rations in the
form of energy bars. The only incriminating item was the shark magnet, which I
had earlier found attached to the air tank that I had retrieved with Manu’s
help the night before. Maybe that would tell me something when I got a chance
to inspect it more closely. At the very bottom of the bag was a taser gun with
one replacement cartridge. I removed the cartridge that was already in place
and gently pressed the trigger to check the charge. Two slivers of electricity
lit up the tip confirming that it was in working order.

A taser is
primarily a stun weapon. A small propulsion charge releases two darts, which
enter the targets body whilst remaining connected to the handheld unit via a
conductive wire. An electrical charge is then fired into the targets body,
which causes neuromuscular incapacitation. It induces uncontrollable and
powerful spasms that take all muscular control away from the victim. I have
used them many times and can vouch for their effectiveness. If needs be, they
can also be adapted for a more sinister use. When the cartridge is removed and
the exposed charge is pressed against a targets body, the attack on the central
nervous system is replaced with an intense localized pain. This makes them an
effective torture device.

I crouched over
where the one calling himself Barrett, lay belly down on the sand. The blade
rose out from his back like a flag placed in the ground of a newly discovered
country. I pulled it out causing the body beneath me to flinch. After wiping
the blood onto the cloth of the Americans shirt, I put the blade into the
rucksack. Then with the full weight of my kneeling body, I pressed down on his
back to keep him from moving. Grabbing hold of his hair, I pulled his head back
to show him what I was holding in my other hand, before placing the tip of the
taser to his torso just below the ribcage.

‘Who are you
working with?’ I asked.

‘Back pocket,’
he replied.

I reached into
his back pocket and found a wallet, which I flipped open. The badge read CIA,
but it may as well have had
printed in Thailand
embossed underneath. It
was nothing but a piece of worthless tat from the Kao San Road.

‘You have to be
kidding me,’ I told him. ‘I’ve seen teenagers use more convincing ID than this
to score liquor.’

The forgery was
perhaps not as obvious as I pretended, but its major mistake was that the eagle
was facing to the East rather than the West. It had its back turned to America
instead of watching over it. At least I now knew how they had been able to turn
Ben against me. These creeps probably had the poor kid convinced that I was
some sort of international terrorist.

‘Who are you
working with?’ I again asked.

He answered only
with silence. If he thought he could ride this out until his friends arrived,
he was sorely mistaken.

‘I know that a
dinghy is on its way to this beach as I speak and you are going to tell me who
will be on it. Marines, terrorists, mercenaries; who is it?’

This time when
he did not respond, I squeezed the trigger. His muscles tightened in response
to the pain, causing his veins to rise up like the connections on a circuit
board. He struggled to free himself of my hold, but it was a futile effort. I
was fully in control of the situation.

‘Do you want
another?’ I asked.

‘They’re just
pirates,’ he quickly replied. ‘We supply them with girls and they give us half
the dough they get from selling them on. No one else is involved.’

‘That is
bullshit,’ I told him. ‘Someone is calling the shots. Who is it?’

I pressed the tip
of the taser more firmly against his side, but refrained from pulling the
trigger. Anticipation of pain can sometimes be worse than the sensation itself.

‘I’m telling the
truth. Clay and me call the shots. It’s a fifty-fifty partnership. If you stop
trying to kill me for a minute, we could cut you a deal.’

‘If I wish to
kill you; I will. What I am doing now is merely listening. You would be wise to
talk whilst I am feeling so receptive. You will not get a second chance. Now
tell me who put you onto the girl.’

‘The redhead?’
he replied, trying his best to sound surprised.

I electrocuted
him a second time, causing him to scream out and kick his feet.

‘Okay, okay,’ he
said. ‘There is somebody else, but you have to believe me when I tell you that
I don’t know anything about them.’

‘Go on,’ I
urged.

He took a deep
breath through clenched teeth.

‘It all started
back in Bangkok. We have a contact in a guest house that tips us off to girls
we may be interested in. Tens of thousands of travellers pass through this way
every year and hundreds go missing. We figured that just a few more every so
often is not going to cause too big a stir. We usually find a couple of cute
girls and work on them in the bars. If they bite, we invite them to the island.
You can probably figure out the rest.’

I thought of
Izzie and Dee and it made me feel sick with disgust. How many more innocents
had these animals taken?

‘And Asia?’ I
asked. ‘You already had two girls, so why take a third?’

‘Why do you
think; money. At first we thought we’d been busted when we found some other guy
waiting for us at the guesthouse. It soon became clear, however, that what he
really had in mind was a business proposition.’

‘He wanted you
to take the girl?’

‘That’s right.
He offered $500,000 with ten percent up front. We were prepared to ditch the
limeys for the bigger score, but he insisted we keep hold of them as cover. He
said that our usual routine would not work on this new girl.’

‘And...’

‘And what? I
already told you everything. For that kind of money, the guy was entitled to
keep as many secrets as he wanted as far as we were concerned.’

I reapplied the
pressure of the taser more firmly into his side to remind him of who was
calling the shots.

‘Keep talking,’
I urged. ‘What did this guy look like? Did he have an accent?’

‘I don’t know.
It all happened so quickly. He was American, I guess.’

‘What about the
money?’

‘He paid cash,
on the spot.’

‘And how do you
contact him? You must have a system in place; a number, hotel room, safety
deposit box; anything?’

‘You’re talking
to the wrong guy. Clay took care of that side of things. He has a satellite
phone. We were told to wait for further instructions. The communication only
works one way.’

I glanced across
to the ocean. Lights were appearing on the horizon. No doubt this was his
back-up on its way. I could not afford to waste much more time on this fool.

‘Where are you
taking her?’ I asked.

He did not
answer. I guessed that he must have seen the lights too. I pulled the trigger
again and this time I could actually smell the burning flesh.

‘YOU FUCK!’ he
screamed, trying once more to break free.

Despite the pain
I had inflicted, his strength had started to return. I stepped off of him and
threw the taser down by the rucksack, replacing it with my gun.

‘Times up,’ I
said. ‘I have just one more question and if I don’t get the right response, I
will kill you.’

He pushed
himself up onto one knee and looked up to face me. I could see in his eyes that
he was not ready to die.

‘Why did you try
to feed me to the sharks?’ I asked.

‘Like I said; we
normally only go for girls with no baggage. We had to check you guys out to see
how well you all really knew each other. The boyfriend proved harmless, but we
sensed that you were a threat from the start. In this business, it does not pay
to take too many chances. We couldn’t have known that you would switch
equipment at the last minute.’

This was good.
They did not know who I was or why I was interested in the girl. So long as my
identity and that of my employer was protected, I was still in the game.

‘You and I are
in the same business,’ I lied. ‘My clients have specific tastes, but they will
have to wait a little while longer to get what they want. You can keep the
girl, but do not think of coming after me. If I ever see you again, I will kill
you without hesitation.’

I motioned with
my free hand for him to stand up and turn around. For a split second, I was
tempted to just shoot him in the head there and then. If anything, it would at
least strengthen the gene pool. As it was, I needed him to deliver my message,
so I simply hit him around the back of the head with the handle of my gun,
knocking him out cold. I was now on my own and faced with a boatload of heavily
armed pirates. My only logical choice was to run. I did not, however, intend to
run far.

I left the thug
unconscious on the beach and hurried back through the jungle towards the
resort. Along the way, I checked my smartphone to see where the signal had
settled. The boat was just over three kilometres from shore. I could have tried
to use the American to negotiate a hostage swap, but this would have been a
suicidal move given the odds against me. Instead, I would have to let them go
and hope to get back on their trail as soon as possible. My transmitter had a
range of two hundred miles so I was confident that I would not lose them.

The first thing
that I had to do was to go back to my cabin to remove anything that could be
traced back to me. Falling for the drugged beer had been an amateur mistake.
Fortunately, I had managed to purge my system of the chemicals before they took
full effect, but it had cost me valuable time. I had been forced to act without
taking the requisite precautions to cover my tracks and risked exposing not
only myself, but the man who hired me.

The bay was
quiet when I made it to the edge of the forest. I kept myself hidden by the
tree line until I was directly behind my cabin. The wood that formed the
structure was old and worn thin by the regular battering of tropical storms. I
used the dagger to pull apart the bottom slats and then crawled inside. It was
still padlocked and from the exterior it would appear that I had not yet
returned. If anybody attempted to get inside, I would have the advantage.

I dimmed my
flashlight and pointed it to the ground. Time was conspiring against me, so I
filled my rucksack with spare ammo and other essentials as quickly as I could.
If I left just one of my many ID’s behind, I could be implicated in any manner
of crimes. By the time I had finished, I could hear men approaching from the
beach. There were two of them. Seeing the fastened padlock, they obviously did
not expect me to be inside and they made no attempt to be quiet as they tried
to pick the lock. I crouched down low and waited with the taser in my hands

When the door
opened, the first guy to enter had his guard down and I tasered him in the
chest. He instantly dropped his gun and fell to the ground in a fit of
convulsions. The second gunman stepped away from the doorway and ran around to
the side of the cabin where he began to fire into the side wall. His weapon was
fitted with a silencer and the only evidence of the ejected bullets was the
splintering of the wooden panels to my right as the flimsy framework gave way
to the barrage of fire.

I quickly rolled
back under the makeshift rear entrance, which I had carved out just minutes
earlier. As I unfurled myself on the other side, I already had the replacement
cartridge loaded into the taser and the gunman in my sights. I shot him in the
armpit. The current surged through his body and as he fell to the ground the
smell of human excrement filled the air.

I ditched the
taser as I was out of cartridges and did not think I would need it as a torture
device again. There would be more of the pirates coming for me and as much as
it sickened me; I knew that I may have to shoot to kill if I was to make it out
alive. I strapped on the rucksack and peered around the edge of the cabin to
see how many more were coming.